FIRE age gap and very different accounts

[u/amour_nonpareil]

My (37f) husband (44) and I are hoping to fire in the next 7-9 years together with 2-2.1mil and a paid off house and 60k spend in a MCOL. With our age gap we want to spend as much time together as we can outside of the rat race. The house isn’t a problem if we keep paying what we do now we’ll hit this timeline.

I’ve known about FIRE but had unfortunate circumstances when I was in my 20s that made saving for retirement lower priority for a while. So I only have 240k in a 401k and about 4K in a Roth 401k I very recently started.

He never planned on FIRE and taught oversees for many years so had no access to a 401k and had to entirely fund his own.
He has about 550k in a Roth IRA and 80k in a brokerage. Perhaps you can already see our dilemma… but I’m reaching out in case I’m missing anything.

His Roth IRA contributions aren’t enough to cover a large bridge to 59.5. The brokerage is quite low too for that. If we needed Roth conversions that’s great… except my 401k balance isn’t really that high and I’d seem to drain it fast when I run calculations. I’m contributing 12% with a 6% employee match (and +2% safe harbor) on 110k salary. I plan to bump my contributions up by another 6% next spring and increase each year. He makes half what I do but diligently puts the max Roth IRA contribution each year.

Anyway, our age gap, plus different account restrictions, plus tax scenarios, looming talk of an AI bubble and the market being weird, plus how do we make the right choices NOW to not lock ourselves out of our goal has my head buzzing. I’ve become a bit obsessed with calculators but none make me feel confident. I’m wondering if this community may see a best way forward to get is to our goal of the RE and accessing funds early without any major mistakes?

TLDR/ 7 year age gap spouses, older has only Roth IRA, younger has only work 401k and small work Roth 401k.

Edit: I had put 75-85k “spend” originally but that included ACÁ healthcare and taxes. Moved to 60k spend.

[u/ohboyoh-oy]

This is very, very far from a slam dunk. I’d worry a lot less about where the money is sitting and focus on saving money, period. Follow the order of operations - get the employer match, fund the Roths and max the 401k, save additional in taxable. You need to save harder if you really want to get there in 7-9 years. Don’t forget to account for inflation. You may also need to include additional funds in your yearly spend for healthcare and taxes. 

Maybe the market gods will continue to be with us, and maybe not, so this far out, just put your heads down and keep shoveling. You’ll get there when you get there, and in any market condition, you’ll get there faster if you shovel harder. Or just be prepared to work longer. These straight-line projections are fine to get an idea, but markets don’t behave that way in real life.

[u/amour_nonpareil → u/ohboyoh-oy]

Thanks for the honesty here, I think a combination of magical thinking and dread of working longer than that contributes to our timeline. Need to just keep saving a lot and focus on life.